For our first official challenge, I welcome a special guest: Mary Anne Walters! Mary Anne is a little like me in that she’s American but has lived here in England for quite a long while. Mary Anne also contributed to Scrapbook Inspirations, and runs UKScrappers.co.uk. But she also has a blog that she fills with technique-based posts, including lots of hybrid crafting and stamping. Please welcome Mary Anne and check out the challenge she has set for you!

Hello there and welcome to Shimelle’s weekend of scrappy goodness. Hope you are having fun and being inspired.

While I am not a primarily digital scrapper, I have certainly made digital pages before and enjoy the process. What I really enjoy more is making custom hybrid bits for use on my own pages. If I think they might be of general appeal I share them on my blog. Sometimes I’ll have an embellishment that I like from some other line, that doesn’t go AT ALL with the paper I am using so I’ll try to recreate it in a colourway that works. Or I’ll have an idea for an embellishment I want that doesn’t seem to exist, so I make it to match what’s in my head – that was the case with these.

I had the papers I wanted to use, primarily the shaped-edge piece from My Mind’s Eye – Stella and Rose. To make sure my elements matched perfectly I used my favourite trick – I find a web image of the paper and open it in PSE. Using the eye dropper to select an area of the paper to match I can then use that colour profile when creating my elements. Although most images are made up of scattered pixels in a variety of colours, usually I can get something that works well with the paper even it it doesn’t match it exactly!

See the end of this post for the download links.

I used them pretty much as they come, with the only trick being lining up the smaller circles to create a scalloped edging under my photo strip. I did consider making a digital scallop border, but to be honest I find it far easier to punch them out singly, ink the edges, line them up and stick them down under the edge of the overlapping paper rather than cutting around a deep scallop.

The circles are designed to nest, so either of the two smaller ones will fit inside the open area of the big one. They look fab if you pop-dot the smaller one. The big one can be punched with a 2” punch just inside the sunburst, so they will go right to the edge even if there is a slight variation to the punch size. Same with the smaller plain circles and a 1” punch. The word-circles also use the 1” punch but punch with a small border of white.

Of course you can resize them it something like Photoshop Elements if you need them to be bigger or smaller. Digital scrappers – if you open the PDf in Photoshop Elements you will see they have transparent backgrounds. SAVE AS a .PNG to use them digitally.

Just in case you want to match the fonts, the blue version uses Steelfish and the pink version uses Lobster 2 (both from Font Squirrel, great for CU-OK fonts and dings).

I’ll look forward to seeing what you make with them!

Mary Anne has designed three sheets of printables for you. Choose from Boy Circles, Girl Circles and Journal Boxes. Though of course you don’t have to choose… you can have them all!

Now for your challenge! Create a project (a layout, card, minibook, etc) using one or more of these printable accents. To enter to win, you’ll need to upload your page to your blog or a page gallery (like Two Peas, UKScrappers or Flickr) and link to your entry using the widget below. Be sure to link directly to the relevant page and NOT to your main blog URL.

One entry will be randomly selected to win a prize pack of scrapbooking supplies and printable elements for hybrid crafting! Entries close at midnight next Sunday (21st August 2011).

Feel free to use the comment section to chat about this challenge, as the entries should go in the linky widget!

Angie, my elements are usually flat in that I don’t add a texture to them digitally. So for these, I printed them on textured cardstock to give them a little oomph. But they can also be printed on heavy smooth paper. I don’t think they would be good printed on printer paper, for example, but heck, you can do what you like. It never hurts to try and see how you like it.

Relly, I couldn’t comment without signing in to google so I’ll do it here!

Love it!. Esp. like the flower cut from the paper. I have that (actually a sheet with blue ones all over it) and considered using it as well – now I wish I had :) I love the circles clustered too, And WHAT a great photo. The baby has the BEST smile – so adorable.

Mary Anne

Jane Says:
12 August 2011, 21:52

Love how you have used these elements on your own page Mary Anne – really effective. I’ll enjoy playing with these. Thanks.

Looking forward to this one. I don’t usually use printables on my pages unless it is sayings or definitions that I have typed out. I have printed off the free ones and they printed soooooo nicely.

If anyone here uses a laser printer, I tried a new paper for these and it printed beautifully. I used ‘Mondi’ Colour Copy Coated Glossy Paper and I was very impressed. Especially as it was a great price (where I live anyway!). I also printed photos on it and they looked almost like getting them professionally done. They also claim the paper is archival safe for 200 years and as I don’t think I will last that long, all will be ok :-) I am new to printing my photos on a laser so if anyone else has a paper I can try, please feel free to suggest it to me.

I printed them onto cream coloured card, and the colours worked well with cream. I used A5 card and told the printer to scale down and that worked well. I cut the circles out by hand and added spotty paper and circular stickers as well.

Jane Says:
13 August 2011, 14:51

Thank you so much for the printables. Very generous to share with us all- can’t wait to use them :)

Peggy Says:
13 August 2011, 15:16

Awesome printables! Thank you. I’m always happy to throw a bit of digi into the mix.

Sara Taylor Says:
13 August 2011, 15:38

Hi – I don’t know if my link has posted correctly as I have only set up a Flickr account so that I can take part today :-) In any case, I have really enjoyed this challenge and made a mini book using the printables – which I am going to use to highlight another page later on.

Wow, Mary Anne, these are lovely – thank you for the freebies!
The photos on your scrap layout made me smile – I have one of those at home! I like the design of your layout, with the bracket at the bottom and the circle-scallop. I also like the “double O” in the title and that great background of squared kraft paper. Thanks for a fab guest-post, I feel inspired to find time and “have a go” with these lovely printables!

Very nice moment with that challenge! Thanx for the freebies and the inspiration!

rt in GA Says:
17 August 2011, 15:31

I used the text circles look and happy for this hybrid layout. Thanks for sharing your designs Mary Anne!

Nathalie Says:
17 August 2011, 15:44

I had a lot of fun with this challenge and really thought of you Shimelle when I created it ;)

Beverley Says:
17 August 2011, 16:51

thanks for the printables, it was an interesting challenge.

nitasha Says:
17 August 2011, 23:59

Thanks so much for the printables! I just posted the card I made, and hopefully will make even more!

Alison Says:
18 August 2011, 08:13

Mary Anne – Thank you so much for these great printables and thanks to Shimelle for showing us where your blog is (another added to my faves – I will never get anything done now) I loved this challenge, the photo is one of my two Aunts I had been wanting to scrap for ages, I used a bit of inspiration from Shimelle’s Miss Erin Sketch and was really pleased with the results, the photo I took shows the stickles up a lot more than it is in real life! I also used the journal boxes and the boy sheet on other layouts over the crop weekend, and feel sure they will be making an appearance on many of my future layouts!!! Thanks so much!

Jenny Says:
18 August 2011, 17:04

The printables are great thanks Mary-Anne! I have linked my layout above. My son is even having ago (but he hasn’t finished his as yet!)

glee Says:
20 August 2011, 05:01

thanks for the printables!
actually dug out my sewing machine for this one, but kept it simple. anyone else doing BPS word a day???

Bethan Says:
20 August 2011, 07:08

loved the printables. Thanks Mary Anne. first time for me to try this technique.

Gemma Says:
20 August 2011, 18:58

Thanks Mary Anne. This is the first time I’ve tried doing any hybrid crafting. I’ll definately be doing it again.

Loved these! I printed all of them, but then I fell in love with just one journaling box and used it for the challenge. ~Jen

AndreaHB Says:
21 August 2011, 22:15

Thanks for the printables Mary Anne, they go so very well with my album colours!

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